Five years later, my sturdy iPad 2 keeps plugging along

It’s been five years since I bought a then-brand-new iPad 2, and—unsurprisingly—the machine I bought back then now shows every bit of its age: There are cracks in the bezel, scratches on the back, and the 30-pin syncing/charging cable that it came with has some bare stretches of wire that need some electrical tape, probably sooner than later.
Yeah, it might make sense to replace it, trade it in, and flat-out retire it—considering how many iPad models Apple has in its sto